Ferras

Imagine you’re five years old. Your American mother and Jordanian father split up and you father kidnaps you and whisks you back to his home country. Most people would never recover from this trauma, but this five-year-old, Ferras, made the best of it. He started tinkering around on a toy piano and wrote his first song for the mother he’d left behind. The rest is history.

Maybe it’s too early to say that. After all, Ferras is far from being history; he’s just getting started. After being kicked off “American Idol,” he moved on to do his own thing. His first album, Aliens and Rainbows, drops on Tuesday, but he has already been featured on MTV and “The Today Show.”

Once you listen to some of his songs, it’s not hard to see why Ferras is garnering such attention from the media. His songs are easy to listen to, reminiscent of other singer-songwriters on a piano (at times he even kind of sounds like a young Elton John for the new millennium) while still being distinctive.

“Liberation Day” practically begs you to sing along and play “air piano” along with the staccato notes. The chorus of “It’s a beautiful day to wake up with nothing to say/It’s liberation/What a wonderful thing to throw your illusions away/It’s liberation day,” while the music crescendos in the background, makes the song perfect for the first few days of summer when you’re finally free from school and driving around with your windows down.

For a smoother, more subdued sound, try “Hollywood’s Not America,” about a young girl who tried to make it as a celebrity, but lost herself in the process. The song lets Ferras show off the range of his voice.

To judge whether or not Ferras is just another “Idol” reject or the real deal for yourself, head to Smith’s Olde Bar Wednesday night to see him opening up for A Fine Frenzy.